Using Pulse by Zaweba on a Mac or a Linux PC
Pulse by Zaweba has a separate version for macOS and Linux with the same five pages, a mini meter and a tray or menu-bar icon. Here is what differs.
Most people meet Pulse by Zaweba on Windows, but there's also a separate version for macOS and Linux. It's built with Avalonia, and it keeps the same shape as the Windows version, so if you use Pulse on more than one computer you'll feel at home on each.
What's the same
The Mac and Linux version has the same five pages: Live, Temperatures, History, Alerts and Settings. It has the mini meter, the small always-on-top window for keeping an eye on things while you work. And it has an icon in the tray on Linux or the menu bar on a Mac, so Pulse can sit quietly in the background just as it does on Windows.
That means the same habits carry over. You sort the Live table to find a busy app, check the Temperatures page when the fans pick up, and look at History to see what happened earlier.
Where the readings come from
Each system offers its own information, and Pulse reads what's there. On Linux the readings come from /proc, the system's own view of running processes, and from hwmon, the kernel's interface to hardware sensors. On a Mac they come from Mach, the core of macOS, and the SMC, the chip that looks after sensors and fans.
Because the sources differ, so do a few details. It's worth knowing them before you start comparing numbers between machines.
Differences on a Mac
On macOS, only your own processes are listed. The system keeps other users' and its own background processes out of reach of an ordinary app, so Pulse shows the programs you are running. For most people that's the list that matters anyway, since those are the apps you can do something about.
Differences on Linux
On Linux, per-app network figures cover your own apps' TCP traffic. So you can see which of your programs is uploading or downloading over ordinary connections, which covers browsers, sync tools and most everyday software.
Drive health on Linux needs an optional helper, which asks for a password when it starts. Reading a drive's health data needs higher rights on Linux, and the helper exists so that Pulse itself can still run as a normal user. If you don't need drive health, you can leave the helper off and everything else works as usual.
Getting going
Install the version for your system and start it. The first page you'll see is Live, with the whole computer's graphs across the top and your apps in the table beneath. Give it a little while and the History page starts to fill, minute by minute.
Turn on any alerts you want on the Alerts page, and open the mini meter if you like having numbers in view while you work. Then close the main window and let Pulse sit in the tray or menu bar.
One app, several computers
If your desk has a Windows PC and a Mac, or a Linux machine for tinkering, having the same monitor on each makes life simpler. The layout, the pages and the way you read them are shared, and the small differences come from what each system allows rather than from a different program. Pulse by Zaweba keeps its approach the same everywhere: clear numbers, a memory of what happened, and a light footprint.
